


alone together

by Areiton, VerdantMoth



Series: Together Alone [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Anal Sex, Grief Sex, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Rough Sex, Thor (Marvel) Needs a Hug, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-03
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-10-21 16:27:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17646260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Areiton/pseuds/Areiton, https://archiveofourown.org/users/VerdantMoth/pseuds/VerdantMoth
Summary: There are rules.They don't talk about them, because they don't talk aboutthis(rule #3) but there undeniably there.It doesn't happen often. It's never planned. It's never gentle.They do not comfort each other.





	1. Chapter 1

The first time it happens, Tony is wearing the black suit he wore to the memorial. 

He hasn't put the Ironman suit on since it happened, isn't sure he  _ can.  _

Thor is in black as well, full Asgardian regalia. He looks like the king he is, with his hair trimmed close and his missing eye and somber clothes. 

There is a emerald green undertone to his cape, there if you look close enough and it mirrors the wild grief in his eyes. 

They fuck in the kitchen, Tony pressed down into the expensive marble, Thor hard and hot and huge inside of him, broad hands rough on his hips. Utterly silent. 

It was so far from what he  _ wants  _ there's no pretending and that makes the orgasm hurt like hell, but it's better than an empty illusion that shatters when he sobers up. 

~*~ 

There are rules. 

They don't talk about them, because they don't talk about  _ this _ (rule #3) but there undeniably there.

It doesn't happen often. It's never planned. It's never gentle.

They do not comfort each other. 

Thor asks, as he strips Tony, “Have you figured it out?” 

Tony never answers.

They fuck. 

They fuck and Tony can  _ feel _ something for those long moments while Thor moves inside him, can feel something other than  _ empty  _ and  _ grief.  _

~*~ 

Steve thinks it's good for them. Thinks they're healing, moving on together. Neither of them correct him, bother to tell him that they're not. 

The cling to their ghosts even in bed--Thor comes with a choked cry of  _ Loki, _ a noise that feels like a sob. 

Tony comes and he scrambles away, curls in on himself, torn between guilt and disgust, stomach churning. 

It feels so fucking wrong, so achingly  _ wrong _ to be in bed with someone who isn't Peter. 

~*~ 

Once. 

Just once. 

Thor reached for him and his hands were gentle, thumbs wiping away Tony's tears, caressing when he should be rough and Tony gasped into that hesitant kiss, leaned into it desperately, thinking,  _ Peter.  _

It took three kisses and Thor's teeth on his throat before he realized what was happening, and bolted, heart pounding and hands shaking. 

He didn't come out of his lab for almost a week, and when he eventually fell back into Thor's bed, almost a month later, they fucked like fighting, his nails digging into broad muscles as he rode Thor, eyes wide open and unflinching. 

~*~ 

There was never any talk, beside Thor's single question. Not during sex. Not during the desperate build up to sex.

But sometimes, after, while Tony curled in on himself and fought his guilt and nausea, while Thor sprawled silently crying next to him--sometimes Thor would talk then. 

Tell stories about Loki and growing up together. They come out choked and tear thick at first, and slowly, slowly, turn peaceful. Almost happy. 

Tony is slower. He guards his memories of Peter, hoards them like a dragon with it's treasure. 

But one night, come drunk and too much Scotch, he tells Thor about the first time he saw Spiderman. About flying over Queens in his suit and catching sight of this  _ boy _ in a shitty suit, cradling a kitten to his chest. 

He cries, telling it, silent tears that Thor doesn't mention. 

It's the first time he doesn't hate himself for this. 

~*~ 

They hurt each other.

He thinks they have to, that what they're doing means they can only hurt each other. 

But they help each other too, and sometimes, when Thor fucks his mouth, rough hands tangled gently in his hair, Tony can forget. 

~*~ 

“Do you think you'll ever get over him?” Tony asks. He's in black again, a new suit that means the same thing. Thor in his Asgardian finery doesn't look strange, anymore. The emerald tones of his black cape is captivating, a subtle reminder to the ghost Thor can't shake. 

His body aches from being held against the wall of his lab and fucked rough and hard. 

Thor is always rough on the anniversary.  

It's been three now, Tony knows the routine. 

“I don't wish too,” Thor says, bluntly honest. 

And Tony nods. 

~*~ 

The others think they're together. So does the world and most of Asgard. 

Tony wonders if they are. Or if they are only together in shared grief and remembrance. 

He closes his eyes as Thor pushes into him with a hitched groan and thinks--at least they aren't completely alone. 

~*~ 

Sometimes, laying in bed next to Thor, he hopes wherever Peter and Loki ended up, they aren't alone either. 

~*~ 

Tony is quiet as Thor strips him, and his hands tremble as he works the bigger man open. Shake the way they haven't in years and his eyes burn with tears. 

He can feel Thor's worry, his hands gentler than he normal is. 

It makes him move faster, harder, desperately. 

After, when Thor moves away, Tony reaches for him and says, breathlessly, “I've figured it out.” 

 


	2. Chapter 2

Thor fucks into Tony, hands ruining his expensive black button-up, hard and almost furious. He doesn’t say a word, doesn’t do more than unlace his pants and bend Tony over the sleek marble.

He does it because… because he hasn’t worn anything but the black mourning armour and the cloak that smells like Loki since the end. Because he looks at Tony sometimes, and the grief swallowing the Ironman whole, and he gets it. Because he can’t do anything else, can’t forget or remember or cope. 

Or, perhaps because he recognizes it. They can’t help each other, not really. No one will ever be able to help them. But Tony’s hips are almost narrow enough in his palms and the heat of him is too hot, but he’s a slick channel and a release and he doesn’t look at Thor with pity. 

Tony looks at him but he isn’t seeing Thor for the guilt in brown eyes that should be green, but are very brown instead. 

It’s a relief, to fuck into him and stare at the back of his head instead. But the grey is a stark reminder of everything the man in front of him isn’t. 

+

The rules aren’t written down anywhere, aren’t official, but they are binding all the same.

Thor broke the rules once. When Tony fit around him all wrong, when his human nails were blunt and scraping instead of sharp and cutting. He asked a question once, as his fingers worked a button on Tony’s pants. 

Tony rips at his shirt to get it off, and he shoves Thor onto his back and he sits hard on Thor’s cock. Tony moves, wild and chaotic, lacking the grace in his movements that Thor desperately craves. Tony moves like a man possessed, like a man searching, and even the knees digging into his sides, the fingers curling around shoulders aren’t enough

Thor hates him, hates this, but he doesn’t stop. 

+

If Tony resents the way Thor sobs his brother’s name afterwords, it never shows. Something dark in Thor, perhaps that same darkness that allowed him to love his brother despite everything, loved the way Tony exhales when he chokes out the name. Like Tony’s been punched in the gut. 

It’s a reminder, heavy and stark of how  _ wrong _ this is.

Steve doesn’t agree, none of them do. They don’t know they disagree, and Tony doesn’t correct them so Thor doesn’t correct them. 

But Tony makes himself small as Thor slinks out of the bed. He pretends he doesn’t see the weeping, pretends he doesn’t look over his shoulder and see Tony’s shaking, vibrating with hurt. 

Thor doesn’t hate him, not really, but he leaves and thinks about the red marks down his chest and how they’re not deep enough. How the bruise in the corner of his jaw is purple, but not nearly dark enough. 

He doesn’t like himself afterwards, and neither does Tony. But he figures the bile taste like grief, and it’s the only flavor they know these days. 

+

He gets drunk. Really, truly, drunk. And he fucks Tony and his skin is pale enough in the moonlight for Thor to lie to himself. Not to forget,  _ never _ forget.

But he’s holding Tony in his palms, guiding him, and he lies to himself and he leans forward. He kisses, slowly, tasting. It’s not right, coppery in the way humans are, but there’s an edge to it, a desperation, a battle for dominance and if Thor closes eyes eyes, if he bites a neck that’s gone gaunt in the last two years, squeezes and doesn’t think about the bones shifting beneath his strength, he can  _ pretend _ . 

Tony doesn’t pretend. Tony flees. Thor doesn’t blame him, but he isn’t surprised when Tony comes back snarling. Half foaming at the mouth, hands fisted in Thor’s hair as he rides him.

Tony bites the corner of his jaw and Thor doesn’t take care for the bruises on the other man’s ass. He’s staring into brown, brown,  _ wrong and brown _ eyes and he hates it. Needs it. Wants to shut his eyes against it. 

He lays in his bed the next morning, sore and bitter and he doesn’t weep, but the bile burns his throat all the way to the backs of his eyes. 

+

Thor fucks Tony, and it’s feral. This is not a battle of equals, not a struggle for dominance. It’s two men trying to carve their pain into someone else’s skin. 

Thor doesn’t want to hold Tony, not really. But he misses the fall. Misses curling into sweaty skin and feeling the extra heartbeat against his chest, exhausted and sated. 

He lays beside Tony in a big enough bed for both of them, but too small for the twin islands of grief. 

So when Tony asks him, “Do you think you’ll ever forget?” Something cruel grows in Thor. He’s wrapping himself back in his Asgardian mourning garbs, throwing the cloak that look like Loki’s eyes in the moonlight over his shoulders and he stares at Tony. Hard. Takes stock of his tousled hair and the scrapes on his face and the way he winces every time he moves. It’s a stupid fucking question and he can see in brown eyes that Tony knows it. 

There’s a lot of answers, some cutting and cruel, some so dishonest even Loki would frown. So he tells Tony, “I don’t wish too,” and leaves without a backwards glance. 

+

He’s both relieved and disgusted with the way people see them. How easily they’ve accepted his “relationship” with Tony. As if he could forget Loki, as if he could move on. He’s loved his brother since the squaling infant came home. But no one judges and they smile at him and the pity that used to wash over him from behind their eyes is gone.

They aren’t together. Not the way people think. But they’re sad little planets orbiting a gaping hole together, waiting to be sucked in. 

+

Thor thinks about Loki often. About his mouth and his eyes eyes and his cock. About his dark hair tangled in Thor’s fist and his skin against Thor’s back and his filthy voice in Thor’s ear as he fucks into them. 

Loki never did believe in an after life and Thor can’t wish his ideas paradise on his brother, just to soothe his own aching soul. 

It’s viciously easy to assume his brother is just… gone. Because the alternative leaves room for something too close to hope. 

But he dreams of him, laying in Stark’s sheets, inhaling their combined scent of sweat and spend and sorrow. 

+

When Tony shows up, when he tugs at the black cloak and digs his fingers under leather, Thor feels something he hasn’t in a long time. 

But he’s had this nightmare before so he doesn’t hurry his hands as they fumble with buttons, as they tug down pants. He lays on his back and lets Tony touch him where no one has, before or after Loki, and he holds a hand under Tony’s jaw. 

Each stroke of his thumb drives Tony, makes his fingers faster and more impatient. 

Thor’s picking up his pants when he hears, breathless and hopeful, “I’ve figured it out.”

His mouth doesn’t taste of bile, for a moment. 


End file.
